Menopause Affects 100% of Women. So Why Isn’t It Funded Like It Matters?

Menopause affects 100% of women. So why isn’t it funded like it matters?

Let’s just say it: menopause sucks - because we’re not sugarcoating anything here. Hot flashes, brain fog, mood swings, joint pain, insomnia, vaginal dryness, random rage over the dishwasher—yep, menopause. But you know what sucks even more? Knowing that every single woman who lives long enough will experience this massive biological transition, and yet our healthcare system barely funds it, our doctors are barely trained on it, and most women are left to white-knuckle their way through it alone.

If you think that sounds dramatic, let me walk you through it. Because the numbers don’t lie.

Every year, the National Cancer Institute pours over $500 million into breast cancer research. And listen—that is essential. Breast cancer is terrifying. It changes lives. It deserves every dollar of that funding and then some. But do you know how much funding menopause research gets through the NIH? About $25 million. That’s not a typo. That’s not even 5% of what breast cancer receives.

Menopause affects all of us—but you wouldn’t know it from the funding

And yet menopause affects every single woman. No exceptions. Breast cancer affects roughly 1 in 8 women over a lifetime. Menopause? It’s 8 in 8. And it’s not a short blip on the timeline. Postmenopausal life can last 30-40 years. That’s not just a transition—that’s a whole second act. One where women are more vulnerable to cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis, Alzheimer’s, depression, and genitourinary symptoms like bladder infections and painful sex.

You know what links all of that? Estrogen. Or, more accurately, the loss of it.

But where is the national awareness campaign for estrogen deficiency? Where are the pink ribbons for hot flashes and heart disease? Where is the month dedicated to bone fractures and vaginal atrophy?

The silence is deafening.

And it’s not just about research dollars. It’s about how we train clinicians. Most providers get maybe a few hours of menopause education in medical or nursing school. Hormone therapy gets framed as risky or unnecessary, despite mountains of evidence showing it can improve quality of life and reduce long-term health risks when started appropriately.

Meanwhile, women are being handed antidepressants for hormone-related mood changes. Or sleeping pills for hormone-related insomnia. Or just being told to eat more flaxseed and power through it. That’s not medicine. That’s medical gaslighting.

And let’s not forget the broader context here: women were excluded from most clinical trials until 1993. That’s not ancient history—that’s recent. We’re still catching up on what heart attacks look like in women, how medications affect women differently, and how hormone shifts impact long-term health. Menopause is still treated as a footnote, a natural inconvenience, a thing to just deal with. But would we ever say that about testosterone deficiency in men? Would we tell men to meditate through erectile dysfunction?

Here’s the thing: I am not saying breast cancer research gets too much attention. I’m saying menopause gets far too little. It’s not either/or. It’s both/and. Women deserve comprehensive care through all stages of life. We deserve to understand what’s happening to our bodies. We deserve research that investigates how to improve our health, not just our survival.

We deserve to be more than an afterthought.

So what can we do?

We can start by talking about it. Loudly. Openly. Without shame. We can demand that menopause be taken seriously—in research, in medical education, in public health.

We can support clinicians who actually know how to treat hormone deficiency and who aren’t afraid to prescribe what works. We can advocate for funding, better training, and better treatment options. We can challenge the idea that suffering through menopause is some kind of badge of honor. Because it’s not. It’s unnecessary. And it’s unacceptable.

Menopause affects 100% of women. It impacts our hearts, bones, brains, sleep, sex lives, relationships, and careers. It deserves real funding, real attention, and real solutions.

So yeah. Menopause sucks. But the fact that we’re not doing more about it? That sucks even harder.